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Center for Maine Contemporary Art

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Center for Maine Contemporary Art

CMCA —Center for Maine Contemporary Art: Advancing contemporary art in Maine through exhibitions and educational programs. www.cmcanow.org

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SAY WOW TO THE NEW CMCA

Experience the art of this generation and the next. CMCA’s exhibitions and educational programs are made to inspire and attract visitors of all ages and backgrounds. With its iconic sawtooth roofline, CMCA’s striking new building—designed by architect Toshiko Mori—provides exceptional exhibition space for presentation of work by contemporary artists. The complex also inclu

des a gift shop, an ArtLab classroom, and a courtyard open to the public. Located in the heart of Rockland’s downtown arts district, CMCA is in walking distance of the Farnsworth Art Museum and Wyeth Center, the Strand Theatre, and dozens of art galleries, restaurants, and hotels. Be ready to say wow!

05/29/2026

Marc Swanson | Death is Expensive is on view. Taken as a whole, the exhibition contemplates the cost of loss in all its manifestations. It recognizes death as not merely the end of a biological cycle but as the unraveling of relationships, systems, identities, and occasionally ecosystems, and in doing so invites us to acknowledge that the expense and extent of loss corresponds to the depth of love.

Learn more and plan your visit at the link in our bio 🕯️

Marc Swanson
For Renée, 2026
Wood, metal, archival tape, frames, paper, porcelain figurine, shells, flowers, metal tassels, mirror, latex and clay dust, lightbulbs, paste necklace
48 x 24 x 11 inches
Courtesy of the artist and the Center for Maine Contemporary Art (Photo:

05/27/2026

We really loved seeing you at our Summer Exhibitions opening reception! Thank you for coming! All four exhibitions are now on view 👀

BIANCA BECK | Eyes
WILL SEARS | The Third Field
MARC SWANSON | Death is Expensive
ABBEY WILLIAMS | Fugue

To learn more, visit the link in our bio 🥳

05/21/2026

CMCA is pleased to celebrate the continued presentation of WILL SEARS // THE THIRD FIELD included in our summer exhibitions!

Join us for a reception this Saturday, May 23 from 3-5pm. To prepare, CMCA will be closed the morning of May 23, until 3pm.

By setting carefully selected colors alongside one another in a systematic, syncopated fashion, Sears creates works that are more than the sum of their parts. Sears knows, for example, that we often process red and blue stripes in close proximity into a field of purple, or that a neutral gray may read warm or cool depending on an adjacent color, and experiments with these effects. If Sears’s colors and forms act as two overlaid compositions existing with some independence—which we might consider as first and second visual fields—then sustained attention generates a third optical field as a result of their interaction. The third field is not merely optical but also meditative and emotional, suggesting things felt rather than seen. To paraphrase Martin, the third field is where the inner eye contemplates all that we have seen, and emotions rise to the surface.

Will Sears
Key I
2024
latex, wood assemblage
20.5 x 17.5 x 1.5 in

Will Sears
Key Il
2024
latex, wood assemblage
20.5 x 17.5 x 1.5 in

Photo:

05/19/2026

ABBEY WILLIAMS // FUGUE

It’s happening! We hope you will join us for the opening of Abbey Williams solo exhibition Fugue, this Saturday, May 23 with a reception from 3-5pm!!

Fugue is a highly musical rumination on our charged historical moment. A five-channel video installation displayed on horizontal monitors in freestanding black pedestals, Abbey Williams has reedited and “remixed” the work since its 2025 premiere in Basel for its American debut at CMCA—a recursive practice central to her process. Over the course of its nearly eight-minute run time, Fugue montages overhead shots of the artist flipping through oversized photobooks of classical architecture, her hands pawing at or caressing marble statues and columns as if they were living flesh. The work eventually pivots to images of the artist’s hands painting on the surface of monitors that she ultimately shatters with a hammer, creating illuminated fissures akin to lightning that she also dangerously caresses. Throughout, Williams intersperses imagery from antiquity with canonical works of popular media, from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Network, and 2001: A Space Odyssey, to footage of performers Grace Jones and H.R. of hardcore band Bad Brains.

Read more at the link in our bio!

05/17/2026

MARC SWANSON // DEATH IS EXPENSIVE

CMCA is pleased to present Marc Swanson’s solo exhibition Death is Expensive, opening this Saturday, May 23, with a reception from 3-5pm.

A defining voice in the q***r contemporary art of his generation, Marc Swanson transforms made and found materials—photographs, taxidermy forms, ornate frames, and more—into remarkably original assemblages that conjure a faded glamor. Setting the lovingly crafted alongside the seemingly discarded, Swanson’s work manages the difficult task of appearing nostalgic and unsentimental all at once. Equally indebted to the conceptual and formal strategies of Marcel Broodthaers’s décors, the decidedly non-conceptual (and usually q***r-coded) professions of window dressing and interior and set decoration, and the almost Brechtian theatricality of the drag, club kid, and goth scenes of the 1980s, his art is a profound reckoning with the cost of love, longing, and survival in our present moment.

Read more about the show on our website at cmcanow.org

Marc Swanson
Still life with flowers, 2022
Wood, chains, antlers, glass, flowers with clay dust and latex, chainmail fabric 79 x 48 x 13 inches
Courtesy of the artist and the Center for Maine Contemporary Art (Photo: Art Index)

05/15/2026

Summer break is almost here — and so is CMCA’s ArtCamp (!) where we invite youth ages 8-14 to look closely, get messy, and discover new ways to engage with this captivating world.

Across four unique weeks, campers will study seeds and blooms, sketch in the galleries, experiment with printmaking and sculpture, and transform movement, color, and observation into original works of art. All inspired by CMCA’s summer exhibitions!

ArtCamp’s small class sizes and hands-on instruction from practicing artists help curiosity, confidence, collaboration, and self-expression to grow.

Programs begin July 20. Sliding scale tuition and a limited number of scholarships available.

To learn more, visit the link in our bio.

05/13/2026

BIANCA BECK // EYES opens today, Wednesday, May 13 at CMCA!

Thank you Jorge Arango for including the exhibition in Portland ’s selection of museum shows to see this summer.

“Bianca Beck (May 13-Sept. 6) will feature five new brightly colored, monumentally proportioned abstract sculptures that gesture toward the figure. ‘As the site of all experience, our bodies hold our own histories, as well as that of each other,’ explains Beck in their statement. ‘We are here because of everything that has come before, and we each have the power to impact what is to come.’”—

Bianca Beck
Stardust we breathe / Skin we shed, 2026
Papier-mâche, wood, steel wire, acrylic and oil paint, steel
Courtesy of the artist, Uffner & Liu, and the Center for Maine Contemporary Art (Photo: Art Index)

Admission fee is pay-what-you-wish as we continue installing two exhibitions by Marc Swanson and Abbey Williams.

05/11/2026

Tickets are now available for the 2026 Art Party at CMCA 🎟️ Join us Wednesday, July 8 for a summer evening of oysters, cocktails, and a movable feast as we celebrate the 10th anniversary of our iconic CMCA building + our summer exhibitions.

This year’s Art Party honors the vision, dedication, and expertise of architect Toshiko Mori; contractor Jay Fischer of Cold Mountain Builders; 2016 Board Chair Charlotte Dixon; and Trustee/Building Committee Chair Jack McKenney. We also celebrate the Capital Campaign donors whose belief in the project helped transform a regional institution into a civic and cultural landmark built specifically for contemporary art in all its forms.

The evening will feature four fantastic solo exhibitions by Bianca Beck, Marc Swanson, Abbey Williams, and Will Sears.

It’s not too late to become a host! Host contributions directly support CMCA’s exhibitions and education programs and are tax deductible (minus cost of meal).

Learn more and get your ticket at the link in our bio 😎

05/08/2026

Tickets are now available for the 2026 CMCA Art Party! Join us for a summer evening of art, oysters, and cocktails (delight in a movable feast!) as we celebrate the 10th anniversary of our iconic CMCA building that changed the scale of contemporary art in Maine.

This year’s Art Party honors the vision, dedication, and expertise of architect Toshiko Mori; contractor Jay Fischer of Cold Mountain Builders; 2016 Board Chair Charlotte Dixon; and Trustee/Building Committee Chair Jack McKenney. We also celebrate the Capital Campaign donors whose belief in the project helped transform a regional institution into a civic and cultural landmark built specifically for contemporary art in all its forms.

The evening will feature four fantastic solo exhibitions by Bianca Beck, Marc Swanson, Abbey Williams, and Will Sears.

It’s not too late to become a host! Host contributions directly support CMCA’s exhibitions and education programs and are tax deductible (minus cost of meal).

Link is… in our bio 😎

Address

21 Winter Street
Rockland, ME
04841

Opening Hours

Monday	10am - 5pm
Tuesday	10am - 5pm
Wednesday	10am - 5pm
Thursday	10am - 5pm
Friday	10am - 5pm
Saturday	10am - 5pm
Sunday	12pm - 5pm

Telephone

(207) 701-5005

Website

http://www.cmcanow.org/

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